Our friend Lisa at Friends of Blackwater NWR has asked me to share news of her latest web log.  She has written an excellent piece on Raptors and Lead Poisoning – I encourage everyone here to read it and spread the word!

From Lisa - 

Raptors and Lead Poisoning

About a week ago, an event regarding a bald eagle came to my attention, and I’d like to talk about it here with the hope of producing some good out of an unfortunate situation.

One of our cam watchers was with his wife near Vienna, Maryland, which is not far from Blackwater Refuge on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. He spotted an adult bald eagle in a tree, and at first he thought the eagle looked very old, since the eagle was listless but with no visible signs of injury. He wrote me when he got home and sent me the photo you see to the right. I forwarded the photo to a volunteer with Tri-State Bird Rescue and Research, which is a wonderful bird rehabilitation outfit on the Eastern Shore. Before anyone could go out and look for the bird, a representative from the Maryland Department of Natural Resources brought a female adult bald eagle to Tri-State, and it had come from this same general area, so we suspect it was the same bird.

Lisa has also included the following:

What You Can Do

If you have a friend or family member who hunts or fishes, then pass along the two brochures provided below to these people. Show them what the consequences of lead poisoning can be and show them that they can make a difference by avoiding lead-based materials. Included in the brochures are tips for finding non-lead products at local retailers.

Fishing and Lead Poisoning (1.3 MB PDF) http://www.friendsofblackwater.org/wordpress/
eagle08/pdfs/WWLfishing.pdf

Hunting and Lead Poisoning (2 MB PDF)
http://www.friendsofblackwater.org/wordpress/
eagle08/pdfs/WWLhunting.pdf

Read the rest on her Web Cam Log here:

Wild Animal Park California Condor Chick Fed by Puppet
Imperial Valley News – Holtville,CA,USA
Escondido, California – Keepers at the San Diego Zoo’s Wild Animal Park fed a 2-day-old California condor chick, the first for the 2008 season, …

California condor chicks hatch VIDEO NOW RELEASED)
This is cute little video of animal we wouldn’t think is generally cute. More importantly it’s about the behind-the-scenes work being done to save a critically endangered species.

Special Thanks to Nora for this news yesterday (yes, I know I’m late on posting to the blog, but posted to the forum yesterday morning!)

Well Kimmarie, she laid 5 eggs! Saw them all Sunday at 9:03 AM.
Congrats!!!

Nora

I’m not counting on number six (although Mariah in Rochester, NY surprised everyone last year!).  Keep in mind that this female laid FIVE EGGS last year, but only four hatched.

I’ll sit down tonight and “do the math” and post my first hatch date prediction later this week!

We are very honored and pleased to announce that this year, we are one of the hosts on the Cornell Lab of Ornithology Nest Cam Web Site!  http://watch.birds.cornell.edu/nestcams/camera/view?cameraID=C100032

It is important to us to be able to share this nestcam with people outside our website and forum and we hope that we can help with Cornell’s goal of educating people on the nesting cycles of a broad range of birds. 

THANKS TO CORNELL for their support and hard work, to our forum member “glenham” for all his hard work (above and beyond the “call of duty”), and most of all to our forum members who followed the Chimney Swifts last year – from rescue from the storm to successful fledge - ALL OF YOU inspired us to work on this unique project for this season! 

And a final personal note, from my heart   A special thank you to marwee!  She is the one who pointed out last year that we ARE FALCONS and FRIENDS and that we did have a mission (even though we may not have seen it right away)!  You have been/are an inspiration to us and we are lucky to have your strong support and encouragement.  I think I can speak for both glenham and myself when I say –  marwee, this cam is in honor of and dedicated to you and to ALL our forum members   This is such a great group of people!  It’s an honor to have you as friends and to be able to share with you all!

I’ve had an email from a long time falcon watcher/friend and two forum members also report that they saw a fourth egg shortly after 4:30pm today. 

Unfortunately the cam has been frozen or unavailable since late this afternoon so no one has been able to get a better look, BUT the reports are from long time falcon fans and looking at the current frozen image from 4:44pm I have to agree, it does look like a fourth egg is in the back of the main three. 

**Unfortunately because Buffalo Audubon Society has claimed copyright on all of their web cam/nest  images we are unable to post or share a copy of the image in question, but if you go here (http://www.buffaloaudubon.com/falconcam2.htm) you might still see it – it’s been frozen for hours now**

Will Lady falcon lay egg number five again this year (last year there were five, but one egg did not hatch)?  We’ll have to wait and see!